With soil warmed, pots washed and seed packets organised into months of sowing, today the first seeds went onto the propagator.
Cayenne Long Slim Hot Pepper from Piccolo, sweet chocolate sweet peppers from Real Seeds, goji berries which were best before summer 2023 and Lidl’s own watermelon ‘Sugar Baby’. Cape Gooseberries which never in the past have ripened before being cut down by a heavy frost. Two beautiful-looking Plantago from She Grows Veg, which have been cooling in the fridge for a month are now ensconced on the window sill, and packets of Limonium, Carthamus tinctorius and Verbena have been emptied in an attempt to reduce the size of my seed collection.
Two cells of Basil ‘Queen of Sheba’ started glowing on the surface when watered, and the immensely satisfying glossy brown pills of the snail vine are nestled just beneath a sprinkling of soil. A small cloche heats a pot of Cephalaria gigantea, and a takeaway dip container is hothousing a scattering of lavender seeds. An experiment, with a ziplock of vermiculite-moist seeds in the fridge to sow as comparison in a month, the seeds were gathered in an almost meditative state with tweezers, lavender bags to follow.
Little squares of soil promising so much, I have visions of homegrown chilis drying in strings; fresh basil adorning every dish and watermelons ripening so sweetly on the windowsill. This will be the year.
a year in the garden 